KINSHASA, Dec 3 (Reuters) – Britain’s Tullow Oil (TLW.L: Quote, Profile, Research) has
enlisted Uganda’s help to win back two disputed Congo oil blocks
it wants to develop with France’s Total (TOTF.PA: Quote, Profile, Research) and China’s
CNOOC, according to a letter obtained by Reuters.

The Nov. 19 letter from Tullow Chief Executive Aidan Heavey,
whose company is battling licence woes in both Congo and
neighbouring Uganda, says it sought the advice of Uganda’s
energy minister and is now confident it can get the blocks back.

KINSHASA, Dec 1 (Reuters) – Democratic Republic of Congo is
seeking political stability, battling economic woes and stubborn
rebel insurgencies as it gears up for elections due next year.

The polls for the presidency and parliament, due to start in
November 2011, will be the second since the official end to the
1998-2003 war, which drew in six foreign armies and resulted in
the deaths of 5 million. Here are some factors to watch.

KINSHASA (Reuters) – Extensive criminal networks within Congo’s army are deliberately fostering insecurity to profit from illegal mining, smuggling and poaching, a report from United Nations experts said on Monday.

Insecurity in Congo’s east has continued despite the end of a 1998-2003 war, displacing more than 1.27 million people and spurred on by competition for natural resources that has had a “devastating impact on security,” according to the report.

KINSHASA (Reuters) – The United Nations’ cultural arm UNESCO has appealed to Congolese President Joseph Kabila to guarantee there will be no oil exploration in the forest home of rare gorillas where two UK-listed firms hold drilling rights.

SOCO International and Dominion Petroleum were awarded a presidential decree to Block 5 of east Congo’s Albertine Graben in June. Plans for a seismic survey include exploding dynamite, despite the fact that the rebel-heavy area overlaps with the protected Virunga National Park.

KINSHASA, Nov 25 (Reuters) – London-listed Tullow Oil Plc
(TLW.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) lost an injunction to stop two offshore companies
developing oil blocks to which it lost the rights in Democratic
Republic of Congo, according to a court ruling seen by Reuters.

Tullow Oil was awarded rights to Blocks 1 and 2 of Congo’s
Albertine Graben in 2006. It is pursuing legal action against
Congo and two British Virgin Islands-registered companies to
which President Joseph Kabila re-awarded the rights in June.

LUBUMBASHI, Democratic Republic of Congo, Nov 24 (Reuters) -
Moise Katumbi, one of Congo’s most powerful men and political
leader of its richest province, is handling two black cowboy
hats as he sits in his office in the country’s copper heartland.

“People say I am bullet-proof, even my hat, but feel this,”
says the 45-year-old governor, a lean and muscled millionaire,
of his sartorial trademark, fingering first a floppy leather hat
and then a felt one.

LUBUMBASHI, Democratic Republic of Congo (Reuters) – More than 650 people have suffered sexual violence during mass expulsions from Angola to Congo in the past two months, according to a U.N. agency report seen by Reuters.

The report by the U.N. Children’s Fund UNICEF said 6,621 people arrived in two territories of Luiza and Tshikapa/Kamonia, in Western Kasai province, in two waves during October.

LUBUMBASHI, Democratic Republic of Congo, Oct 30 (Reuters) -
A consortium of South Korean companies will seek a
minerals-for-infrastructure deal in Democratic Republic of Congo
that could be worth $1 billion, Congolese and South Korean
officials told Reuters late on Friday.

The proposed deal — involving refurbishment of a copper
mine and construction of an Atlantic deepwater port — would
bolster South Korea’s bid to secure long-term access to metals
while speeding Congo’s development, South Korean ambassador to
Congo Kim Sung-chul said.

KITCHANGA, Democratic Republic of Congo, Oct 29 (Reuters) -
Each day Joyce goes out into the bush and assembles five tiny
bundles of wood for sale, only to have one taken from her by
former rebels now in the ranks of the national army.

“I have to submit as I don’t want to be raped,” she said,
her baby wrapped to her back in a camp for thousands of
displaced people in Kitchanga in Congo’s troubled east.

KINSHASA, Oct 26 (Reuters) – An international court
rejected a bid by miner First Quantum Minerals (FM.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) to fully
protect its disputed Congolese assets, the company said, a move
Congo said gave it the right to proceed with their sale.

First Quantum said it had failed to secure complete court
protection for its $750 million investment in a copper tailings
project in Congo while it seeks to defend it, but no ruling had
yet been given and the case is not due to be heard until 2012.